Ardnish Was Home Episode 22

LOUISE Thus it was that at five in the morning, we four were in our tidy scarlet uniforms, with a box of medical equipment, stepping confidently on to the lighter.

“Doing a task for the Brigadier doctor,” I said primly, as we sat down.

The sergeant just nodded. Fifteen minutes later, we parted the curtain of the largest tent and were confronted by the sight of dozens of men lying on camp beds and the ground.

There was a look of surprise from everyone, and then suddenly a cheer went up so loud that others came to see what was going on.

Our faces were pink with embarrassment, but our chests swelled with pride at the welcome. A doctor came across to us, and we explained that we were there to help.

“By God, we need it,” he said. “I’ve had no sleep for two nights, and we’re down to three of us, with 200 injured and more coming in all the time.”

There were 20 canvas bell tents, a kitchen and store tent, and a marquee to treat the newly arrived.

Within minutes, we had managed to arrange big vats of boiling water and were unwrapping bandages, putting on antiseptic creams, using scalpels to cut off bits of gangrene and generally doing all the work and more that we had been doing on the Gloucester.

Frustration

After two months, we could do most of the practical work that the doctors did, anyway. Yet, although we never would have expected it, I think that just our being there and caring for the men was the most important part of it all.

Sometimes, the sea was too rough for the small boats, and the lighters would be nowhere to be seen. Occasionally, they came back with the injured men when the hospital ships were full and they were turned away.

We felt like crying with frustration when we knew they could have saved a man on the Gloucester, but here we were only 300 yards away, unable to get him onboard and watching him die.

What would normally have been the job of the ship’s surgeon became ours as we held the fort. Digging a bullet out of a man’s leg when he had been injured for three days with his leg swollen to twice its normal size brought forth tears of gratitude. He held my hand and whispered his thanks, even though our work doubled the pain he was in already.

We did days of this, non-stop. The patients were from Norfolk, Ireland. There were Gurkhas, Aussies – all cheerful and grateful. Our uniforms were soaked in blood and covered in dirt, and we were exhausted but we felt elated, too.

During a lull, us four nurses sat outside a tent in the weak autumn sun with a cigarette and a cup of tea and talked.

“My lord, if my George could see me now,” Lorraine exclaimed. “Filthy hair, mud and blood everywhere, broken nails – he’d go back to his old girlfriend in a jiffy!”

We all laughed. We all looked the same. One morning, the Brigadier doctor appeared suddenly beside me. “Jolly well done, Nurse Jones. I gather you are the heroine of Suvla – we should call you Florence Nightingale.

“I have another half a dozen nurses on the next boat, so you and your girls can go back to the ship and find your beds.

“We haven’t heard from the Queen Alexandra HQ in Malta yet, as it happens, but you can assume that you have done the right thing. The men are all the better for it.”

Later that morning, the four of us stepped back on to the Gloucester Castle and were met by many nurses and doctors all keen to shake our hands. Even Matron Davy looked us in the eye and congratulated us.

“You did the right thing,” she said and smiled. “It made a huge difference to the men on the beach, and we are proud of you.”

Overjoyed, we ate a huge meal, had a thorough scrub and went to our cabin to sleep for twelve solid hours.

WAR

Louise is off duty now. It is night, and with dawn not far off, the place is quiet apart from some murmuring in the tent next door.

I dangle my hand in the sand below the camp bed and wave at the flies buzzing around my head. It is cold. But at least I have blankets; the men in the trenches will be freezing.

I have been avoiding the issue, not confronting what happened to me.

I have always tended to look for good things and avoid unpleasant ones, so my mind naturally wanders to Ardnish or Louise.

I blank out my pain. All of the other men in here were either shot or hit by shrapnel from the shelling.

In the other tents there are men who have dysentery.

I find it painful to think about Sandy. After my family, he had always been my closest friend and, of course, what happened to him took place at the same time as I was injured.

Sandy was a gangly fellow, always smiling, with a friendly word for everyone.

Punishment

That’s not to say he didn’t have a temper. It’s just that it was slow to come, and when it did, you were as well to keep your head down, for as quickly as it appeared it was away again, and he had forgotten all about it.

He had black hair and a very fair complexion, which took a lot of punishment from the Mediterranean sun.

He didn’t talk much and was far more thoughtful than me, though when he did speak he was worth listening to. We were very close.

It was the fishing that was his true passion. He would sit with his rod for hours waiting for a bite, whereas I was always itching to be at something else.

We were as different as chalk and cheese: he excelled at school while I was always in trouble; he would help with the chores while I was up to mischief – allegedly.

He was as good as a brother to me and much closer than Father Angus, who was just that wee bit older.

We were met by many nurses and doctors all keen to shake our hands. Even Matron Davy came to congratulate us

Ardnish Was Home is published by Birlinn. The third novel in the series, Ardnish, was published in 2020. www. birlinn.co.uk